Mikal Bridges
Bridges for the 2016–17 Villanova Wildcats
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| No. 25 – Villanova Wildcats | |
|---|---|
| Position | Forward / Guard |
| League | Big East Conference |
| Personal information | |
| Born |
August 30, 1996 Malvern, Pennsylvania |
| Nationality | American |
| Listed height | 6 ft 7 in (2.01 m) |
| Listed weight | 191 lb (87 kg) |
| Career information | |
| High school | Great Valley (Malvern, Pennsylvania) |
| College | Villanova (2014–present) |
| Career highlights and awards | |
Mikal Bridges (born August 30, 1996) is a college basketball player for the Villanova Wildcats.
Bridges attended Great Valley High School in Malvern, Pennsylvania, where he was coached by Jim Nolan. As a junior, he averaged 20 points and eight rebounds per game. During his senior season, he was named First Team All Class AAAA. He posted averages of 18.5 points, 7.2 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 2.4 blocks and 1.6 steals per game as a senior. Bridges was named to the Philadelphia Inquirer's All-Southeastern Pa., boys basketball first team as a senior. In his career, he had 1,340 points and 511 rebounds. Coming out of high school, he was ranked by ESPNU as the 82nd best player nationally, and committed to Villanova in June 2013.
Bridges came in and redshirted his freshman season and assisted in scouting players. In Bridges's first year with Villanova he appeared in all 40 games for the Wildcats. He said he had to do a lot of lifting weights and changing his three point shot. He had a key role coming off the bench in the 2016 NCAA Tournament, scored 11 points in a Final Four rout of the Oklahoma Sooners. Bridges won the NCAA championship along with his teammates for the school for the first time since 1985. He averaged 6.4 points, 3.2 rebounds and 1.1 steals per game as a freshman. "He came in as a high school scoring phenom like they all do, so I'm really proud of how he has opened up his game defensively," coach Jay Wright said.
Coming into the 2016-17 season, Bridges was slated to be the team's sixth man but started every game after Phil Booth went down with a knee injury in November. As a sophomore, Joe Juliano of The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote, "If there is such a thing as a five-tool player in college basketball, Mikal Bridges is the model." He became well-regarded as a lanky forward who could score and play excellent defense and often guarded the opposing team's best player. In the NCAA Tournament, he scored 13 points to help Villanova to a first round victory over Mount St. Mary's. Bridges averaged 9.8 points and 4.6 rebounds per game while shooting 54 percent of his field goal attempts and 39 percent of three point tries. He improved his scoring as the season progressed, averaging 12.3 points in his last 12 games of the regular season. Along with Creighton's Khyri Thomas and teammate Josh Hart, Bridges was named one of three Big East defensive player of the year honorees, being third in the conference in steals with 1.9 per game.
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